The Vinnies

I'm not as enthusiastic about Halloween as some people. I didn't even think I'd be dressing up as anything. But the night before October 31st, I was hanging out with my friends Javi and Abby talking about costumes, and for some reason I suddenly had the desire to dress up as something to the huge Halloween party that was going to happen. The following conversation then ensued:

Me: Maybe I should just go as a boy for Halloween. Javi could you lend me some of your clothes?

Javi: But my clothes don't even look like typical boy clothes. 

Me: Oh, Vinnie dresses up really classy all the time. Maybe Vinnie could lend me some clothes! (Knowing Vinnie, this was totally not likely, and I knew that as I said it.)

Abby: Maybe you should just go as Vinnie for Halloween!

Javi: Yeah, that way you could be Mini Vinnie!

It was one of the most genius things I have ever heard. And this is Harvard.

Anyway, here's a picture of Abby, Vinnie, and me.

So this Vinnie character. I don't really know if I should type this because if he found out that I wrote an entry about me being a mini version of him for Halloween, an entry that included a description of him, I think it might put a strain on our relationship. 

But whatever, I don't have to tell him, do I? 

Anyway, Vinnie is a very interesting fellow. He was born in New York City and spent part of his childhood there before moving to Shanghai and going to the foreign language school there for most of his schooling life. He spent his last few years of high school at a boarding school in Virginia. He speaks five languages, and his English has this really bizarre hybridized British accent. He also speaks without any filters whatsoever, and doesn't seem to care at all how others take what he says. He's rather posh, cosmopolitan, and can be condescending. He has one of the most amazing smiles I've ever seen, but I like to say that he shows it for all the wrong reasons. He also pointed out once that he and I have the same ridiculous laugh, which is actually kinda true. He's a lot of fun to psychoanalyze. 

Vinnie's very hard to understand, more than any normal human being is hard to understand. We just don't get what his deal is, but we continue hanging out with him anyway because he's that friend and for some reason we find pleasure in his company. 

Vinnie also never goes to parties and doesn't care much for going out at night, so the idea of me going to the huge Halloween party dressed up as him only made the idea funnier to us. 

I finalized the idea of going as Mini Vinnie the following morning, and made plans to go to the thrift store the evening of Halloween. I went with Abby and Annie. All I needed for the distinct Vinnie look was a blue argyle sweater like the one he's wearing in the above picture. I roamed the store and found one almost right away in the men's section. It was a bit large on me, but I didn't think I could find any better, so I held on to it.

I had a vague memory of seeing a Banana Republic tag on Vinnie's blue argyle sweater and wondered, what if there's another sweater in the rest of that rack? I should look again just in case.

So I returned to that rack and looked through the rest of the sweaters hanging there and found another blue argyle sweater.

And yeah, it was Banana Republic.

What's more, it was the perfect size for my purposes. 

It was too good to be true. FATE WANTED ME TO BE VINNIE.

I bought the sweater with no regrets. And when I assembled my outfit, my friends were impressed. They were even impressed with my imitations of his mannerisms, which at times were disturbingly accurate. 

This is a picture of Mini Vinnie and Javi. Vinnie and Javi are really close; we could even consider them best friends. We refer to them as the twins. This picture was taken before the party. 

I went to the party with some of my good friends. We made our way through the hordes of people in costumes and onto the dance floor, and a few minutes in I heard words I never, ever thought I'd hear in that environment.

"Oh my god, it's Vinnie!"

And they weren't referring to me, oh no. They were referring to real Vinnie. 

In a state of shock and suddenly conscious of my guise, I walked over to where my friends pointed him out, and there he was, completely out of character, dancing like a maniac. It became quite obvious he was drunk, but somehow he was still completely able to speak rationally. He's just a very confusing person, okay. 

"I thought you said you weren't going to go tonight!" I yelled through the music.

"I didn't want to, I just got locked out of my room!" he replied. 

"I DRESSED UP AS YOU!" I exclaimed. "I didn't think you'd actually be here!" 

I don't recall Vinnie saying anything in particular to that. He just kept on dancing and having a blast, which was so bizarre to me. He said he didn't want to go to the party, yet his actions completely conveyed the opposite. 

Abby, Mini Vinnie, Vinnie, Javi, and our personal sexy male stripper

If only he was wearing his blue argyle sweater. But still. I think I pulled off his face pretty well.

Vinnie didn't stay too long at the party. He asked us if we'd like to accompany him to Felipe's to get a burrito, but we declined. Vinnie left the party on this strangely positive note that I hadn't seen in him before. 

The verdict was that Vinnie on Halloween was actually an extremely fun person. So fun, it was pretty scary. But I suppose that's what Halloween's for, am I right?